The Rotax Pan-American Challenge is set this week for the NOLA Motorsports Park in New Orleans. Nearly 200 international drivers will compete for the final tickets to be awarded toward the 2013 Rotax Grand Finals next month. Many North American pilots will be in contention for the Senior Max, DD2, DD2 Masters, and Junior Max tickets, along with the top three in Mini Max and Micro Max awarded a spot in the Invitational event the same weekend.

EKN will have updates here throughout the event, beginning tomorrow morning when Qualifying begins. Watch for other updates on the EKN Facebook, Twitter and Instagram accounts.

So, i saw a facebook thread, I believe on the EKN page where there were several pissed off people that were upset that Rogero walked off of the scales, to help a teammate get a ticket. Why is this so bad?

I believe the integrity of the sport suffers when stuff like this happens. Its obvious that Ashley is a great driver and has a great chance at moving up through the ranks. Putting politics in the middle at an event like this is not good. If you didnt plan on going through tech if you won the race then you shouldnt have raced at all. Competitors get upset that they may have been beaten by a racer that cheated, weather its true or not, and didnt go through tech. In this case I dont believe that they were cheating but instead trying to give a team mate the opportunity to represent their country at the worlds. Rotax can stop stuff like this real easily in the future. Simply make a rule that says “Competitors that refuse post race technical inspection in any approved Rotax Worlds Championship qualifying race will no longer be eligible to participate in the world finals for that race year. Competitors will forfeit any qualifying tickets won at other events and the next competitor shall take his/her place”. Something along those lines would stop it in its tracks. The reason why there is tech is so that everyone knows that you were all racing under the same conditions. If you allow competitors to race but then walk away you lose that integrity.